Italian court convicts Google execs over video

ITALY

Published 4:00 am, Thursday, February 25, 2010

Photo: AP

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In this video image Judge Oscar Magi, left, flanked by an unidentified aide, delivers a verdict in a court room in Milan, Italy Wednesday Feb. 24, 2010. In the first such criminal trial of its kind, Judge Oscar Magi, sentenced three Google executives Wednesday to a six-month suspended sentence and absolved them of defamation charges. Three Google executives were convicted of privacy violations in Italy because bullies posted a video online of an autistic boy being abused _ a case closely watched due to its implications for Internet freedom. Convicted of privacy violations were Google's senior vice president and chief legal officer David Drummond, retired chief financial officer George Reyes, and Google's global privacy counsel Peter Fleischer. Senior p less

In this video image Judge Oscar Magi, left, flanked by an unidentified aide, delivers a verdict in a court room in Milan, Italy Wednesday Feb. 24, 2010. In the first such criminal trial of its kind, Judge Oscar ... more

Photo: AP

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FILE - In this Thursday, Dec. 3, 2009 file photo, David Drummond, Senior Vice President and Chief Legal officer of Google, addresses the 62nd World Newspaper Congress in Hyderabad, India. Three Google executives, including David Drummond, were convicted of privacy violations by a judge in Milan, Italy, Wednesday, Feb. 24, 2010, in allowing a video of an autistic boy being abused to be posted online, a case that has been closely watched in Italy for its implications on Internet freedom. Judge Oscar Magi sentenced the three to a six-month suspended sentence and absolved them of defamation charges. The trial had been closely watched since it could help define whether the Internet in Italy is an open, self-regulating platform or if content must be better mo less

FILE - In this Thursday, Dec. 3, 2009 file photo, David Drummond, Senior Vice President and Chief Legal officer of Google, addresses the 62nd World Newspaper Congress in Hyderabad, India. Three Google ... more

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FILE - In this May 30, 2007 file photo, a Google sign inside Google headquarters is seen in Mountain View, Calif. A Paris court has convicted Google Inc. Friday, Dec. 18, 2009, in a copyright infringement case over online publication of French books.(AP Photo/Paul Sakuma, file) less

FILE - In this May 30, 2007 file photo, a Google sign inside Google headquarters is seen in Mountain View, Calif. A Paris court has convicted Google Inc. Friday, Dec. 18, 2009, in a copyright infringement case ... more

Photo: Paul Sakuma, AP

Italian court convicts Google execs over video

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In a case that could have broad implications for Internet use around the world, an Italian court convicted three Google Inc. executives Wednesday of criminal charges for failing to quickly remove an uploaded video.

Officials at the Mountain View company pledged to appeal, saying if the verdict is allowed to stand, "the Web as we know it will cease to exist."

Legal experts agreed the case raises troubling questions for all U.S. Internet companies that do business globally.

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"If intermediaries like Google or the person who hosts your Web site can be thrown in jail in any country for the acts of other people and suddenly have a legal obligation to prescreen everything anyone says on their Web site before putting it online, the tools for free speech that everyone uses on the Net would grind to a halt."

In absentia, the executives were handed six-month suspended sentences, although the judge also cleared them, along with a fourth executive, of defamation charges.

The case revolves around a video uploaded to Google Video in 2006 showing an autistic boy in Turin being pummeled and insulted by teenage bullies at school. The video was uploaded before Google bought the more popular YouTube.

The video drew 5,500 views in the two months before Google Italy pulled it down two hours after being notified by police. The boy's father and an advocacy group for people with Down syndrome complained the video violated privacy protection laws.

Prosecutor Alfredo Robledo told the Associated Press the verdict upheld privacy principles and put the rights of individuals ahead of those of businesses. He said the case will force Google and other firms to be held accountable for screening videos hosted on their sites.

"This is the big principal affirmed by this verdict," Robledo said. "It is fundamental, because identity is a primary good. If we give that up, anything can happen, and that is not OK."

Internet principles

In a company blog post, Google vice president and deputy general counsel Matt Sucherman called the ruling "astonishing" because "none of the four Googlers charged had anything to do with this video."

The verdict "attacks the very principles of freedom on which the Internet is built," he wrote.

The benefits of the Web could disappear if "sites like Blogger, YouTube and indeed every social network and any community bulletin board are held responsible for every single piece of content that is uploaded to them," he said.

Support for Google

A host of U.S. technology associations jumped to Google's defense.

"Most troubling, what happens in Italy is unlikely to stay in Italy," said Leslie Harris, president of the Center for Democracy and Technology. "The Italian court's actions today will surely embolden authoritarian regimes and be used to justify their own efforts to suppress Internet freedom."

But, he added, "this is an example of a bird in the tunnel telling us how easily it could get way out of control. This is not the only instance of countries or governments lashing out rather clumsily with blunt instruments about things they don't like on the Internet."

Local distinctions

Indeed, firms large enough to have an Internet presence in other countries have faced numerous skirmishes over local distinctions of laws such as copyright and intellectual property. Recently, Google has become embroiled in a dispute with China, saying it will stop censoring search results in that country after attacks on the Gmail accounts of human rights advocates there.

For those firms, there are no easy answers, said James Burger, an intellectual property attorney with the Washington, D.C., law firm Dow Lohnes.

"I could see Italy arguing we should adopt their law in this instance," Burger said. "There is a larger problem, which is: How do we deal with U.S. companies being slammed abroad for acts that are legal in the United States?"

Pressure on Italy

Jason Schultz, director of the Samuelson Law, Technology and Public Policy Clinic at UC Berkeley, said it's unclear whether Italian officials will try to apply the ruling more broadly.

"There will be a lot of pressure on the Italian government to rethink this shortsighted approach once the Italian citizenry realizes how limiting it will be to only have access to government-approved media," Schultz said.

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